Numerous activities exist that require humans to safely and rapidly descend from high elevations. Mountain climbing, for example, is one such activity. While climbing up a mountain may be time-consuming and laborious, the descent should be as quick, smooth and safe as possible. Other examples are fire and rescue operations where personnel may have to descend to or from a particular location as quickly as possible without risking harm to an individual or himself. For example, coast guard rescue crews typically descend from a hovering helicopter in order to board a distressed vessel, while firemen may have to quickly lower victims from a burning structure. In both cases, time is of the essence and the need for quick and safe descent is paramount.
Many rope descent systems and techniques have been developed over the years to tackle these and other scenarios. For example, military personnel worldwide use a technique called a “fast rope” that permits military units to quickly descend from a hovering aircraft. Current fast rope techniques were first developed by the British military but have since found widespread use throughout the world. The great attraction of the fast rope technique is that it permits an individual or several individuals to simultaneously, quickly, stealthily and accurately descend from a high elevation. While there are many variations, the basic fast rope technique consists of two pieces of equipment: a rope of sufficient diameter to permit the user to firmly grip it with his hands and a pair of leather or heavy-duty gloves, such as Nomex™ gloves, for example. The user simply grips the rope and either slides down the rope in a similar manner to a fireman sliding down a pole or angles his feet into the rope using his body to create a torque between hands and feet.
While fast rope techniques have the advantages of multiple users on the rope, fast descent speed, accuracy and simplicity, they do so by sacrificing safety and load-carrying capabilities. Since equipment must often be dropped separately, procedures for equipment drop-off and pick-up can be time-consuming and inefficient. Safety issues with fast rope techniques also loom large. Of all current rope descent mechanisms and techniques, only the fast rope technique lacks belay or self belay capabilities, e.g. where a belayer or the user himself may suddenly stop or slow his descent. In fact, since the user is merely holding onto the rope with his hands, freefall accidents are common, as are burns, concussions, broken limbs and so forth.
Other traditional rope descent systems and techniques have been developed such as belayer, rappel rack, brake tube and FIG. 8 devices, for example, but they take more time to set up, permit only one person on the rope at a one time and require the user to wear a specialty harness.
These and other problems exist.